The Farmer’s Market Still Delivers

By the time COVID finally came for my family, in January 2022, the customary comforts were wearing thin. Long walks to nowhere while listening to Leonard Cohen, outdoor meet-ups on empty golf courses with double-masked friends,even nibbling a cookie on the patio of my local coffee shop while gazing at the sky were doing nothing for me.

I needed to leave my neighborhood. I headed to the original Farmer’s Market in search of a boost. Almost everything was exactly how I left it. Beat-up, pale green cafeteria chairs cluttered the aisles, Magee’s House of Nuts was still churning out peanut butter in its mesmerizing mixer, the Du-Pars’ case was stacked with legendary pies of every variety, and Magee’s Kitchen was slinging corned beef and cabbage, Irish-style. Attendance was perfect that day—enough people to feel human, but no one close enough to inhale droplets.

The Farmer’s Market, now surrounded by the razzle-dazzle Grove shopping center, has been a source of solace for me since I moved to LA in the early eighties. Like many New Yorkers, I missed my hometown terribly when we first moved to southern California. Having been raised to devour a city by foot, I had trouble finding Los Angeles in the first few years. A flaneur in a city without any streets, I often felt bereft.

Unbeknownst to us, our first apartment in West Hollywood was ten minutes from the Market. Back then, it was easy to dip in for a quick bite—parking was free! But it was never about the food. It was more about a place that felt urban: a mess of real people and a cacophony of  languages in a sea of colorful candies, exotic fruits, decorated layer cakes, glazed donuts and mis-matched signage. It was sensory overload, and it matched my metabolism.

I would sometimes go just to inhale the energy and do some eavesdropping. It was so New Yorkish that when my mother visited from Miami, she would take the bus to the Market, to hang out while I was at work. She loved to be wherever the action—and the pastry—was.

These days, toward the twilight of the pandemic, I am happy to report that the Farmer’s Market remains an excellent place to go and forget how awful everything is. I watched work colleagues gossiping about their boss, a couple on what looked like a first date, and a classic grouping of white-haired gents bent over their coffees, in no hurry at all. They could have been teleported in from New York’s Upper West Side.

These days, toward the twilight of the pandemic, I am happy to report that the Farmer’s Market remains an excellent place to go and forget how awful everything is.

Like a real city, of course, the market does evolve. I can recommend new places and foods like Nonna’s handmade empanadas; Michelina, an artisan French bakery serving authentic tartines and pure butter croissants for breakfast; and the restaurant Singapore’s Banana Leaf, currently getting raves on Eater.com.

An old favorite, Monsieur Marcel has extended his empire along the western rim. In addition to the original wine bar, there is table service at a respectable bistro. A Marcel-branded fish market sells pre-cooked lobster, crab, several types of caviar and a selection of sparkling fresh fish to-go. The small indoor department store is packed with all things French and culinary. Opinel knives and Laguiole flatware, Provencal ceramics, straw baskets, confiture, liqueurs, artisan cheeses, bon bons, party goods, tablecloths, ovenproof porcelain, bottled cherries in brandy. Mostly affordable, and much easier than a trip to Paris right now.

The pièce de résistance however is Littlejohn’s Candies stand. Tucked in a center aisle, this handcrafted candy shop whose logo features a jaunty little man in top hat and tails looked and felt exactly as I remembered it. The owner is still making fresh toffee, pillowy chocolate-dipped marshmallows and excellent caramels also dipped in chocolate.

On my last visit, I overheard the client ahead of me explaining her favorite pandemic pick-me-up to the salesperson ringing up her small order. “I come a few times a week for the free sample,” she said brightly.

As the tagline says, “handcrafting smiles since 1924.”

Los Angeles food writer Helene Siegel is the author of 40 cookbooks, including the “Totally Cookbook” series and “Pure Chocolate.” She runs the Pastry Session blog.